Analyze This

I took Greenie to the range last week. Greenie is my nickname for my iPad, since it has a green cover. I don’t know why I never took video of my swing before. I suppose I was too self-conscious before. But now, I have no shame. I mean, I just publicly admitted that I nicknamed my iPad.

Anyhoo, toward the end of my session at the range, I propped up Greenie on the stall floor in front of me, recorded some swings with my 6-iron and 7-wood, and headed back home to analyze them. Hubby downloaded an app called VideoPix that allowed me to play the video in slow motion.

I started with the 7-wood swing video. It was like watching a surveillance tape and immediately recognizing the perpetrator. I took the club back, hinged my wrists, started the downswing, then – okay, pause, there it is right there – the wrists unhinge and release too early! Busted! Caught on tape!

I played back the video again. Just after I released my wrists, I could see the club shaft flex and bow, unloading all the energy. Unfortunately, because I released too early, this was happening way before the clubhead actually met the ball. By the time it reached the ball, the club shaft had already shot its wad, so to speak.

It was a harsh reality. But it made me finally understand the importance of wrist hinge. It’s like this: Try using a plastic fly swatter with a straight arm and wrist. Then try using it by flicking your wrist. With a straight arm and wrist, it would be hard to get the swatter to slap a fly with any kind of conviction. Only if you swat with some wrist action can you get the swatter to go “Splat!” And the way I’ve been swinging, it’s like I’m swatting in the air, at nothing.

However, the situation is a little better with my irons. In the video of my 6-iron shots, the shaft unloads closer to the bottom of the swing, where the ball is, which may explain why I am seeing improved distances with them. Perhaps because irons are shorter and lighter, I can swing them faster, so even if I can delay releasing just a little more than before, I can benefit a lot.

In the still shot above, you might notice that the club shaft appears flexed almost into a C-shape. This is not because my swing speed is so fast it can actually cause the shaft to bend that much. The extreme shaft curve is actually a result of the quality of the recording device, as I learned from a YouTube video on Golf Shaft Flex Distortion.

If the video records by scanning from the top down, there is a fraction of a second delay in scanning the image as it progress from top to bottom. Depending on the shutter speed of the camera, this can result in a really distorted image. Coincidentally, I shot my irons video with Greenie set horizontally and the camera scanning from top to bottom. I shot my woods video with Greenie vertically, which is like turning the camera on its side, which resulted in less top-to-bottom distortion.     

   

Hmm, that could also explain why my thighs look a little heavier in the irons video. And, of course, the camera adds 10 pounds.